The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-09-25
THE NEGRO AND HIS NEEDS.


THE NEGRO AND HIS NEEDS.
The demands upon the charitable, and the
humane, and the religious are many. Never
is there time when some good cause is not
waiting to be furthered by philanthopic aid.
Reform associations of all sorts invite assist
ance and cooperation; churches ask to be
pulled out of the mire of debt; educational
institutions at home and abroad call for sup
port and encouragement, and foreign missions
like Oliver, are forever calling for more
For some reason the redemption Of the
heather in foreign lands seems to the greater
number of Christian people contamination
more devoutly to be wish ed and more earn
estly to be labored for than the promotion of
any other cause, however worthy. On the
same principle, perhaps, that the Greeks
seemed to the Saxons blameless race because
they were so far away, the souls of the bar
barians of other lands appear of more impor-
lance in the eyes of the religious and civilized
world than do those of the benighted who are
near at hand.
The foreign missionary field is broad and
the laborers sent to it are not too many
nor the money poured out upon it too much;
but sometimes it seems that the needs of the
world were better served if the ears of the re-
generate were open first to the cry of the hea-
then at their own doors; that if one must be
neglected, it were better, for instance, that it
should be the Chinaman, who is at least doing
no harm, than the negro freedman, whose ig
norance is not only his own destruction, but
a menace to his country. The condition Of
the negro should arouse every sentiment of
patriotism, of humanity, of religion. Though
a quarter of a century has elapsed since the
slaves were set Free their situation is still
pathetic; it is more-it is one of the dramatic
spectacles of the age. Weighed down as they
were by centuries of ignorance, their first de-
mand after liberation was, not for ven geance
upon their former oppressors, norfor division
of the wealth which they had helped to accu-
mulate, but for education. No more
remarkable or touching sight has been
witnessed in the history of the world
than the thousands of old and toil-worn men
and women painfully struggling with the keys
of knowledge-the alphabet and the spelling
book. Thousands more never found the
opportunity they sought. The blessings they
hoped to grasp were STILL and are still, beyond
their reach. AS stated by DR.. Hartzell, in his
plea for the Freedmen's Aid Society before
the Indiana conference last week, ilhteracy is
growing in the South because the population
is increasing more rapidly than the educa-
tional advantages The development and
progress of the colored people have been great,
all things considered, but they have not been
rapid enough, and have not kept pace with
their desires and their capacities. In this
northern country, where school-houses are the
mile posts and the road to learning is made
smooth, it is not easy to realize that the South
is so far behind in intellectu al development
that hundreds of thousands of its youth are
without facilities for securing even the rudi-
ments of culture. 1t is not religious revivals
they want, but education. They have the
religious sentiment already well cultivated
but without mental training and intelligence
to give them ballast, what will it avail them
That the rising generation of negroes is
not Indifferent to the advantages of learning
is shown by the reports of the schools estab-
lished for their benefit More eager appli-
cants come than can possibly be accommo-
dated and the privations they endure in
order to enjoy the coveted privileges, are like
those experienced by our own forefathers
who thirsted for knowledge. Notes from the
Tuskeegee Normal School state that number
of the young men who had been in attend
ance were spending their vacation in the
Birmingham coal mines in order that they
might be able to return to school. 1t is told
of many men famous in the country's history
that they obtained their education under diff
fcuties They studied at night by the light
of pine knots, they plodded miles through
snowdrift and forest to country school